In line with the bankers’ committee directive, Fidelity Bank Plc put the amount of debt owed by its delinquent debtors at N6.126 billion.
The bank also published the names of the directors of the affected companies.
The defunct Starcomms Limited emerged top on the list with a total outstanding debt of N3.090 billion. The directors of the telecommunication firm included Chief Maan Lababidi; Mr. Paul Edwards; Alhaji Tajudeen Dantata; Dr. Chris Ogbechie; and Olusola Oladoke.
Some other firms on the list included Kesio Associates that is indebted to the bank to the tune of N328 million; Diesel Solutions Limited with outstanding debt of N324 million; Patem Global Limited with N268 million and Lucratel Limited with N262 million. In addition, Global Partners Haulage also featured on the list with outstanding debt of N247 million.
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) in the country had resolved to publish the identities of all serial debtors to the financial industry from August 1, 2015. It had been estimated that three per cent of total industry credit of about N13 trillion was bad debt.
CBN Director of Banking Supervision, Mrs. Tokunbo Martins, had said: “The total credit is about N13 trillion. About three per cent of that is non performing and August 1, 2015, is the deadline publishing the list of debtors.”
She had said given that the upper limit of non-performing loans as a percentage of total credit was five per cent, the current three per cent figure of bad loans yet indicated that the banking system was stable in spite of the latest push to recover the outstanding debts.
